IHI would like to thank the co-chairs for their extraordinary effort and commitment in developing the program for the 19th Annual National Forum.

Robert Colones, MBA, is President and Chief Executive Officer of McLeod Health System and McLeod Regional Medical Center. Prior to his current role, he served as Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer and was charged with the leadership and daily operations of four hospitals and affiliates of the McLeod Health System. Mr. Colones is a member of the Quality Committee of South Carolina Quality Forum Advisory Committee. In 2004, he began serving on the South Carolina Governor’s Committee on Health Care Access.

Lillee Smith Gelinas, RN, MSN, FAAN, Vice President and Chief Nursing Officer, VHA Inc., has been at VHA since 1986, helping member hospitals improve their clinical and economic performance. She serves on numerous national committees, including the IOM Performance Measures subcommittee, Joint Commission Nursing Advisory Council, and she co-chaired the National Quality Forum Nursing Project which resulted in 15 consensus performance measures being established for nursing sensitive care. Ms. Gelinas was appointed as the "consensus nominee" for the nursing profession to the American Health Information Community (AHIC), a commission authorized by the White House to promote IT in health care within 10 years, for which she co-chairs the AHIC Electronic Health Record workgroup. As a member of the Exempla Healthcare Board of Directors, she is chair of the Governance Committee. A long time faculty member for IHI, Lillee was one of the first IHI Breakthrough Series trainers

David C. Leach, MD, Executive Director, Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education, is interested in linking improvements in medical education with improvements in patient care and organizational models.